792 SOCIOLOGY 



utility of association. Their like-response to stimulus, their imita- 

 tive acts, the frequent appearance among them of impression and 

 submission, are all purely instinctive phenomena. Not so are the 

 social relations of human beings. There is no human community in 

 which instinctive like-response to stimulation is not complicated by 

 some degree of rational comprehension of the utility of association. 

 The combinations, however, of instinct and reason are of many 

 gradations; and the particular combination found in any given 

 community determines its modes of like-response to stimulus and 

 its consciousness of kind establishes for it a dominant mode of 

 the relation of mind to mind, or, as Tarde would have phrased it, 

 of intermental activity. This dominant mode of intermental 

 activity inclusive of like-response and the consciousness of kind 

 is the chief social bond of the given community, and it affords the 

 best distinguishing mark for a classification of any society on psych- 

 ological grounds. So discriminated, the kinds of rational or human 

 societies are eight, as follows: 



(1) There is a homogeneous community of blood-relatives, com- 

 posed of individuals that from infancy have been exposed to a 

 common environment and to like circumstances, and who, therefore, 

 by heredity and experience are alike. Always conscious of them- 

 selves as kindred, their chief social bond is sympathy. The kind or 

 type of society, therefore, that is represented by a group of kindred 

 may be called the Sympathetic. 



(2) There is a community made up of like spirits, gathered per- 

 haps from widely distant points, and perhaps originally strangers, 

 but drawn together by their common response to a belief or dogma, 

 or to an opportunity for pleasure or improvement. Such is the 

 religious colony, like the "Mayflower" band, or the Latter-Day 

 Saints; such is the partisan political colony, like the Missouri and 

 the New England settlements in Kansas; and such is the commun- 

 istic brotherhood, like Icaria. Similarity of nature and agreement 

 in ideas constitute the social bond, and the kind of society so created 

 is therefore appropriately called the Congenial. 



(3) There is a community of miscellaneous and sometimes lawless 

 elements, drawn together by economic opportunity the frontier 

 settlement, the cattle range, the mining camp. The newcomer 

 enters this community an uninvited but unhindered probationer, 

 and remains in it on sufferance. A general approbation of qualities 

 and conduct is practically the only social bond. This type of 

 society, therefore, I venture to call the Approbational. 



The three types of society thus far named are simple, sponta- 

 neously formed groups. The first two are homogeneous, and are 

 found usually in relatively isolated environments. The third is 

 heterogeneous, and has a transitory existence where exceptional 



